From Receptionist To President: Gerun Riley's Vision For Leading The Multibillion Broad Foundation

Igor Bosilkovski
, ContributorI write about wealthy people who shape the world in a variety of waysOpinions expressed by Forbes Contributors are their own.

This week, FORBES sat down with billionaire Eli Broad and Gerun Riley, President of the Eli and Edythe Broad Foundation, at his apartment in The Sherry Netherland to discuss the future course of his philanthropic organization. Earlier this month, the longtime Los Angeles art patron, science benefactor and public education reformer announced that he is stepping down and formally retiring from the organization where he had been working full time since he sold insurance company SunAmerica in 1999 for $18 billion.

“I’ll be doing a lot of traveling, going to movies, socializing, reading all sort of things” Broad says, sitting by an array of hardcover art books and across a Lichtenstein painting on the wall. “We have Ray Dalio’s book here, but haven’t gotten to it yet, it’s quite thick.”

The reason for this meeting with Forbes was to introduce Gerun Riley, the 41-year-old president of his foundation, to a broader audience. Riley joined the organization in 2003, when she was just 26 years old, getting a job as receptionist after a “memorable interview” with Broad. Now she is overseeing one of the nation’s biggest foundations, which has given away $4 billion so far and has a $2.5 billion endowment.

Photo courtesy of Gerun Riley

Photo courtesy of Gerun Riley

Riley, who graduated from Bowdoin college with a degree in neuroscience, worked in the pro bono department of law powerhouse Skadden, Arps, Slate, Meagher & Flom LLP and Affiliates and in nonprofit healthcare lobbying in New York, then moved to Los Angeles and landed a short gig with Arianna Huffington, before finally ending up at the Broad Foundation. “Over the last 14 years I feel like I’ve received degrees in architecture, law, medicine just by working with Mr. Broad” Riley says.

Her job will be to continue his legacy in key areas such as science and art and look to make a bigger impact in others. In science he has donated $700 million to create The Broad Institute, a human genome and stem cell research in Cambridge, Mass. that operates as a partnership between MIT and Harvard. “The legacy beyond creating groundbreaking science is that the Institute s a model for collaborative science and not how institutes typically function” Riley said. The Foundation has also created stem cells centers at three California universities - USC, UCLA and UCSF. A longtime contemporary art collector who met Jean Michel Basquiat, Keith Haring and Jeff Koons early in their careers, Broad is a founding chairman and life trustee of the Museum of Contemporary Art in Los Angeles, life trustee at MOMA and LACMA, and most notably, with his wife Edythe, a co-founder of The Broad Museum in downtown Los Angeles. The Broad Museum had 1.5 million visitors in the first two years since its opening - three times more visitors than what Broad and Riley expected, with 65% of the audience being non-Caucasian. In both these areas, Riley’s main job is to maintain Broad’s commitment and continue to fulfill his pledges. Her bigger challenge will be trying to tackle public education, something with which Broad has wrestled for years.

Broad, a son of Lithuanian immigrants who suffered from dyslexia as a kid who put himself through Michigan State University by driving a delivery truck is an active supporter of public charter schools and an avid opponent of Betsy DeVos, whom he called unprepared and unqualified in a letter to Senate leaders prior to her hearing. “Part of my challenge and responsibility is that I get to continue realizing the Broads’ vision, but also evolve the organization in ways that feel appropriate” says Riley, whose 6-year old daughter goes to a public Spanish-language immersion school. “Their vision is so deeply rooted in Eli’s personal experience as a poor, immigrant, dyslexic boy in Detroit who would have never had the success had it not been for his public school teachers.”

The Broad Foundation’s recent effort was to establish a great STEM school in Los Angeles that would focus on Latino, black and women students. “There are already 95 STEM schools in LA, but not one of them is more than 65% proficient in math, Riley says. “Not one.” The Foundation introduced legislation in Sacramento, which was not successful as they faced great opposition from the teacher’s union. The project is in suspense right now. “There’s a lot of work in education that is frustrating - that is why we need young, fresh troops” Broad says. “My goal now is to have Gerun do everything.”